


Status quo ante

by all_ships_are_my_otp



Category: Silicon Valley (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Gilfoyle is in love he just doesn't realize it yet, Happy Ending, M/M, Oblivious, Pining, confident!Dinesh, the closest thing to smut I'll probably ever write
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-16
Updated: 2017-08-16
Packaged: 2018-12-16 07:56:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11824383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/all_ships_are_my_otp/pseuds/all_ships_are_my_otp
Summary: Gilfoyle reflects on how being CEO changed Dinesh. And tries not to think about how attractive some of these changes are.





	Status quo ante

When Dinesh was appointed the new CEO of Pied Piper, Gilfoyle thought it was pretty funny. Not laugh-out-loud, _holy shit Dinesh is totally shitfaced right now, and is he trying to dance?, I wish I caught that on camera_ funny. It was more _this is going to crash and burn and I can’t wait to watch from the sidelines as that happens_ funny.

 

And of course Dinesh did inevitably fuck things up, and of course it was pretty goddamn hilarious.

 

Because Dinesh had only been CEO for such a short amount of time, Gilfoyle didn’t really feel like anything had changed when they abandoned PiperChat to work for Pied Piper. Dinesh’s stay as CEO was a tiny blip in the story of Pied Piper, and Pied Piper—with Richard as CEO, Jared as Head of Business Development and Dinesh and Gilfoyle as senior programmers—was status quo.

 

Even so, Gilfoyle found it astonishing how quickly Dinesh’s time as CEO had been forgotten. Tech news outlets immediately ceased to mention Dinesh Chugtai, as if he had never existed in the first place. During company meetings, Richard spoke about being CEO as if it were the most natural, obvious thing in the world, as if he had always been CEO and always would be. Even Dinesh seemed to immediately forget. His fitted suits disappeared into whatever dark corner of his closet they had originally come from. They were replaced by Dinesh’s trusty, strangely-colored rugby shirts. Dinesh stopped putting product in his hair, wearing excessive amounts of cologne, and started to slouch at his desk. Just like before.

 

The entire world—including Dinesh himself—had decided that nothing about Dinesh changed. But somehow, Gilfoyle couldn’t help but notice behavior that suggested otherwise.

 

There were a lot of little things. Dinesh stopped checking Tinder obsessively. He stopped calling his parents so much. He wrote neater code. He smiled more.

 

Then there were the bigger things. Like how Dinesh started to take Gilfoyle’s insults in stride, instead of feeling personally attacked by them. Once, Dinesh was videochatting with a woman he had met online. Their conversation was going surprisingly smoothly, so Gilfoyle felt obligated to mess with Dinesh. He started to yell various phrases, loud enough so she could hear—“you do know he’s super ugly in real life, right?”, “Dinesh uses avocados for kissing practice”, “Dinesh once fucked a coconut because some stranger on the internet dared him to”, “Dinesh once tried to shove a cucumber up his ass”, “Come to think of it, I think he has a weird food fetish”, “You should best stay away”—but instead of becoming flustered and angry like he usually would, Dinesh just smiled at his webcam.

 

“Sorry about that,” Dinesh said, laughing easily. “Obviously, none of that is true. That’s Gilfoyle, one of the guys who lives in the incubator with me. I think I mentioned him. He’s a Satanist and has an odd sense of humor.”

 

“Dinesh once got a boner from a Java method I wrote!” Gilfoyle tried again. Now, he could hear both Dinesh and the mystery woman laughing. So he stopped. It wasn’t that he was giving up...he just had a lot of work to do.

 

Gilfoyle spent the rest of the evening listlessly browsing Reddit and wondering when Dinesh was going to end that stupid call already so they could play video games together.

 

But the fundamental change Dinesh underwent was in his self-confidence. Specifically, that he finally had some.

 

Gilfoyle didn’t really notice it until he and Dinesh were out on one of their coffee runs. Dinesh spotted a beautiful woman with a Google laptop bag, and decided to strike up a conversation with her. That part wasn’t new. It was how Dinesh behaved. He smiled, he seemed genuinely interested in what she had to say, he made some jokes that weren’t dumb rehearsed pick-up lines, she laughed, because they were actually pretty funny. Their conversation was cut short—she had to run to a meeting—but she left Dinesh with her number and a wink.

 

Gilfoyle wondered where Dinesh’s sudden effortless confidence had come from. Previously, Dinesh would have to choose between the “effortless” and the “confidence” part—leading to incredibly awkward conversations in which Dinesh was either pitifully socially inept, or painfully inauthentic. Now he had both and appeared to be comfortable in his own skin.

 

When Dinesh returned to Gilfoyle, showing him her business card proudly, his eyes were bright, his shoulders were no longer slumped, and he was half happily grinning, half smugly smirking. It was a good look on him. Too bad his hair was flat and boring, as opposed to slightly ruffled and strangely arousing. Otherwise, the resemblance to his former CEO persona would have been uncanny.

 

 _It’s not that I’m attracted to Dinesh,_ Gilfoyle would tell himself. _I’m just noticing certain traits that he has recently developed that I happen to find attractive._

 

But then he would do things like lock his bedroom door, set up an encrypted VPN and watch hours of YouTube videos interviewing Dinesh when he was still CEO.

 

**

 

They were sitting on the couch playing video games, Dinesh wearing a suit, Gilfoyle in sweatpants. Dinesh had a date in less than an hour, at a fancy restaurant. Gilfoyle too had a date of sorts—with a bottle of beer, his laptop and the couch.

 

The suit was one of Dinesh’s CEO suits. Gilfoyle was performing particularly poorly in the game. He blamed it on the alcohol. He hadn’t had more than a couple of sips of beer all evening.

 

“Is something bothering you?” Dinesh asked the next time they hit a loading screen. “You’ve been acting different lately.”

 

“No. Different how exactly?”

 

“Exactly? I don’t know. You barely talk to me anymore. We talk about work, and about video games, but that’s about it. You’re somehow...quieter.”

 

Gilfoyle didn’t speak, not knowing what to say, until he realized he was corroborating Dinesh’s allegation. “Isn’t that how things always were?”

 

“No!” Dinesh said immediately. “Before, you would mercilessly tease, mock and provoke me. But you’ve stopped.” The game was about to start another round, so Dinesh hit pause on his controller. “Are you—are you mad at me? Did I do something to piss you off?” Dinesh looked at Gilfoyle hesitantly.

 

It made no sense. Gilfoyle could sort of understand finding Dinesh’s newfound confidence attractive. Confidence was an attractive trait. Easy. But this? Dinesh looked the picture of uncertainty. He looked like he had no idea what Gilfoyle was going to say. Which made sense, because Gilfoyle also had no idea how he should respond to that. Maybe Dinesh’s sudden attractiveness had to do with the fact that he was looking at Gilfoyle like he actually cared what Gilfoyle was going to say. Like Gilfoyle’s opinion was the only one he cared about at all.

 

“No, I’m not mad at you. I stopped fucking with you because...things changed,” Gilfoyle said carefully.

 

“What changed?” Dinesh asked softly.

 

Something— _let’s just say the alcohol, even though I’ve barely had anything—_ coerced Gilfoyle into truthfully responding. “Honestly? You. You’re more confident and you have higher self-esteem. I stopped the teasing because it stopped working. Nobody seems to have noticed, or wants to acknowledge it, but you changed.”

 

“Good change or bad change?” One of Dinesh’s hands wandered up to his hair, flattening it self-consciously.

 

“No, keep your hair like it was before. It looks hot when it’s spikier,” Gilfoyle blurted. A second later, he realized what he had just said. _Shit_. He could feel the heat pooling in his cheeks, and hoped his facial hair was thick enough to hide any visual evidence from Dinesh.

 

Dinesh leaned in closer, and gently grabbed Gilfoyle’s right wrist. Gilfoyle’s mouth suddenly felt dry. Dinesh guided Gilfoyle’s arm towards his head, then let Gilfoyle’s fingers run through his hair. It felt smooth. Was hair usually that smooth?

 

“Better?” Dinesh asked, smirking, and Gilfoyle suddenly became aware of the fact that only a few inches separated Dinesh’s mouth from his.

 

Not trusting his voice not to crack, Gilfoyle nodded stiffly.

 

“You know, you’ve changed too,” Dinesh said, letting go of Gilfoyle’s wrist and instead gently resting his hand on Gilfoyle’s thigh. Gilfoyle closed his eyes, trying not to think about how the warmth of Dinesh’s touch was rapidly spreading throughout his entire body, and extremely grateful that he was wearing loose sweatpants. “You weren’t always this cautious. Around me, at least.”

 

“I’m not--” Gilfoyle began to say, voice slightly hoarse, but then Dinesh moved even closer to Gilfoyle, essentially sitting on Gilfoyle’s lap. Dinesh squeezed his thigh and Gilfoyle unsuccessfully stifled a moan.

 

“And you definitely never used to unironically call me hot,” Dinesh continued.

 

“I was—making an objective observation,” Gilfoyle croaked.

 

“No, I believe that was your personal opinion,” Dinesh said teasingly. His lips moved even closer to Gilfoyle’s, and Gilfoyle found himself automatically leaning in, so it was impossible to say who initiated the kiss. By the time it was over, Dinesh had Gilfoyle pinned down on the couch, giving Gilfoyle a great view of his full lips, slightly-more-rumpled suit and definitely-more-mussed hair.

 

“So, here’s an objective observation: You’re a great kisser,” Dinesh said shyly.

 

“I believe that’s your personal opinion,” Gilfoyle murmured.

 

Dinesh glanced at the TV clock. “So, my date started ten minutes ago.”

 

“I guess I’ll have to be your date for tonight,” Gilfoyle said.

 

Dinesh smiled. “Not just for tonight though, okay?”

 

“Okay.”

 

Things were definitely changing from the way they were before. In a permanent, real way. But Gilfoyle thought that was pretty fucking great. Because fuck status quo.


End file.
